Finance is one of the main channels through which Europe and China have become deeply integrated with each other, though it is also perhaps the most opaque. Much needs to be done to improve understanding and update knowledge of the deeply entangled and fast-changing financial and monetary landscape in which European and Chinese institutions, firms, markets and investors operate. How does Chinese finance operate in European markets? How are European financial firms invested in China? Do they complement or compete with one another in other countries and international institutions? The working group provides a platform to bring together researchers from across academia, government, civil society and industry that share a common concern for the changing nature of Sino-European financial and monetary interdependence, both within their respective regions and worldwide.

The analytical scope of the working group extends across key areas of Sino-European financial and monetary relations including the politicization of financial investment (e.g. mergers and acquisitions, greenfield FDI), currency internationalization (Renminbi, currency swaps, credit lines), competitive dynamics of development financing (sovereign lending, development banking, private public partnerships), and the variegated modalities of financialization through which an expanding array of tradeable asset have been put into circulation (encompassing equities, bonds, various kinds of derivative, intangible assets and cryptocurrency).

These developments have implications for a plethora of governance realms including macroeconomic policy, central banking, financial market regulation, the global governance of aid and development, and pressing issues like debt restructuring in the Global South or financing a green transition. Given the complex and increasingly tension-laden geopolitical landscape in which Sino-European financial and monetary relations unfold, there is a pressing need to develop new analytical and methodological tools for advancing the scholarly and societal understanding of the changing politics of global finance.